3D IPIX?

[P3D Greg Erker <erker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

http://www.ipix.com/

  Ipix (Interactive Pictures Corporation) makes
a very neat plug-in that allows you to view a
360 degree horizontal and vertical image.

  They do it by taking two photos, 180 degrees
apart, using an 8 mm circular fisheye lens. They
then scan the two images and do some processing
to allow you to "look" in any direction, and
zoom in and out.

  This is very near to a virtual reality type
view, but without the big goggles over your
face.

  One interesting use (see their site) is
Toyota using it to allow you to sit in the
driver seat of one of their cars and look
around. A very good use of this technology
and something you couldn't do in a printed
brocure.

  So this makes me wonder how it could be
done in 3D. A pair of side by side fisheye
camera would take a stereo pair but the
image off to the side would lose depth
due to the apparent reduced stereo base.
Plus the two cameras would "see" eachother
due to the 180 degree field of view.

  Perhaps the best thing would be to
spin an RBT (with say 28 mm lenses) and take
say 6 photos to cover 360 degrees horizontal.
(there wouldn't be any vertical panning
allowed beyond the vertical height of the
image). Hopefully the edge distortion would
be low enough that you could (relatively)
seamlessly pan across image boundaries without
painfull 3D (or 2d) distortions.

  For moving subjects the best might be an
array of cameras pointed in different compass
directions. Eg. 4 in a square, or 6 in a hexagon
or 8 in an octagon, depending on the horizontal
coverage of the cameras. Again the images would
have to be digitally merged into one horizontal
panoramic view.

  A 3D version of the Ipix system and plugin
might do wonders for getting the 2d masses to
want 3d on their computers.

  Thoughts or comments anyone?

Greg E.



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